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Doo-Bop
| length = 40:02 | label = Warner Bros. | producer = Easy Mo Bee | prev_title = Dingo | prev_year = 1991 | next_title = Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux | next_year = 1993 }} Doo-Bop is the last studio album by American jazz trumpeter Miles Davis. It was recorded with hip hop producer Easy Mo Bee and released posthumously on June 30, 1992, by Warner Bros. Records. The album was received unfavorably by most critics, although it won a Grammy Award for Best R&B Instrumental Performance the following year. Background The project stemmed from Davis sitting in his New York City apartment in the summer with the windows open, listening to the sound of the streets. He wanted to record an album of music that captured these sounds. In early 1991, Davis called up his friend Russell Simmons and asked him to find some young producers who could help create this kind of music, leading to Davis' collaboration with Easy Mo Bee. At the time of Davis' death in 1991, only six pieces for the album had been completed.Miles Davis Community at Sony Music Entertainment. Easy Mo Bee was asked by Warner Bros. to take some of the unreleased trumpet performances (stemming from what Davis called the RubberBand Session), and build tracks that Miles "would have loved" around the recordings. The album's posthumous tracks (as stated in the liner notes) are "High Speed Chase" and "Fantasy". A reprise of the song "Mystery" rounded out the album's nine-track length. Release and reception [ Allmusic review] | rev2 = Down Beat | rev2Score = | rev3 = Encyclopedia of Popular Music | rev3Score = | rev4 = Entertainment Weekly | rev4Score = B– | rev5 = Los Angeles Times | rev5Score = | rev6 = Q | rev6Score = | rev7 = The Rolling Stone Album Guide | rev7Score = }} Doo-Bop was released by Warner Bros. Records on June 30, 1992. By May 1993, it had sold approximately 300,000 copies worldwide. The album received negative reviews from most critics. Greg Tate called it an "inconsequential" jazz-rap record from Davis, while Billboard found the R&B-based album to not be "quite cut as deeply" as his 1970s funk recordings. In Entertainment Weekly, Greg Sandow wrote that Davis' solos were performed with "impeccable logic and wistful finesse" but accompanied by hackneyed guest raps and unadventurous hip hop beats, which reduced Doo-Bop to "elegant aural wallpaper". Los Angeles Times critic Don Snowden believed the album "succeeded only in fits and starts" because of Davis' first time working with hip hop tracks, "the rigidity" of which Snowden felt often reduced his "muted-laced-with-echo trumpet to just another instrumental color in the mix". Richard Williams from The Independent viewed the tracks as a regression from the ambient-inflected Tutu (1986) album as they inspired trumpet improvisations from Davis which displayed "a rhythmic banality that was never remotely discernible in Miles's pre-electric playing". In a positive review, Q called Doo-Bop "a collector's piece ... as hip, sexy, open and complex as the best of his work since he elected to turn to FM airplay music in the 1980s". Musician considered it a pleasant hip hop album and an accessible introduction to Davis' music for "younger ears weaned on modern beats". In Down Beat, Robin Tolleson wrote that Davis sounded less timid than on previous few records as "his phrasing and concept adapt sharply from tune to tune". Doo-Bop won the 1993 Grammy Award for Best R&B Instrumental Performance. Track listing *All tracks written by Miles Davis/Easy Mo Bee, except where indicated: Personnel Credits are adapted from The Last Miles (2007) by George Cole. * Miles Davis – trumpet * Deron Johnson – keyboards * J.R – performer * A.B. Money – performer Technical * Gordon Meltzer – executive producer * Matt Pierson – associate producer * Easy Mo Bee – producer * Daniel Beroff – engineer * Reginald Dozier – engineer * Zane Giles – engineer * Randy Hall – engineer * John McGlain – engineer * Bruce Moore – engineer * Arthur Steuer – engineer * Kirk Yano – engineer * D'Anthony Johnson – engineer, mixing * Eric Lynch – engineer, mixing * Robin Lynch – art direction * Ted Jensen – mastering Charts References Further reading * * External links * Category:1992 albums Category:Jazz rap albums Category:Miles Davis albums Category:Albums produced by Easy Mo Bee Category:Warner Bros. Records albums Category:Albums published posthumously Category:Hip hop albums by American artists